Cognitive Distortions

Another affliction taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_distortion
I've come to the conclusion that perhaps some dark mangers just do not know that they have these diseases; well, at least wishing that helps me sleep. For me to think that any individual can be diabolically vile and commit to premeditated actions is just too depressing.

Many cognitive distortions are also logical fallacies; related links are suggested in parentheses.

1. All-or-nothing thinking - Thinking of things in absolute terms, like "always", "every" or "never". Few aspects of human behavior are so absolute. (See false dilemma.)
   
   
2. Overgeneralization - Taking isolated cases and using them to make wide generalizations. (See hasty generalization.)
   
   
3. Mental filter - Focusing exclusively on certain, usually negative or upsetting, aspects of something while ignoring the rest. For example, focusing on a tiny imperfection in a piece of otherwise useful clothing. (See misleading vividness.)
   
   
4. Disqualifying the positive - Continually "shooting down" positive experiences for arbitrary, ad hoc reasons. (See special pleading.)
   
   
5. Jumping to conclusions - Assuming something negative where there is no evidence to support it. Two specific subtypes are also identified:
   • Mind reading - Assuming the intentions of others.
   • Fortune telling - Predicting how things will turn before they happen. (See slippery slope.)
     
     
6. Magnification and minimization - Inappropriately understating or exaggerating the way people or situations truly are. Often the positive characteristics of other people are exaggerated and negative characteristics are understated. There is one subtype of magnification:
   • Catastrophizing - Focusing on the worst possible outcome, however unlikely, or thinking that a situation is unbearable or impossible when it is really just uncomfortable.
     
     
7. Emotional reasoning - Making decisions and arguments based on how you feel rather than objective reality. (See appeal to consequences.)
   
   
8. Making should statements - Concentrating on what you think "should" or ought to be rather than the actual situation you are faced with, or having rigid rules which you think should always apply no matter what the circumstances are. Albert Ellis termed this "Musturbation". (See wishful thinking.)
   
   
9. Labeling and mislabeling - Explaining behaviors or events, merely by naming them; related to overgeneralization. Rather than describing the specific behavior, you assign a label to someone or yourself that puts them in absolute and unalterable terms. Mislabeling involves describing an event with language that is highly colored and emotionally loaded.
   
   
10. Personalization (or attribution) - Assuming you or others directly caused things when that may not have been the case. (See illusion of control.) When applied to others, blame is an example.

Narcissistic personality disorder

According to DSM IV-TR (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) criteria and taken from Wikipedia,

A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:[1]

1. Has a grandiose sense of self-importance
   Which gets translated to an inordinate amount of budget being allocated to offices with plus chairs and secretaries. Not to forget bookshelves that typically gets stocked with books that you don't read, and folders that are really empty.
   
   
2. Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty or ideal love (megalomania)
   Seriously, this is beyond me.... :p
   
   
3. Believes they are "special" and can only be understood by, or should associate with, people (or institutions) who are also "special" or of high status
   A general manager should never seek advise from a senior manager, should never seek advice from a manager and so forth...
   
   
4. Requires excessive admiration
   It's your birthday, and you're wondering where's the gift baskets from your staff and the vendors.
   
   
5. Has a sense of entitlement
   If the managerial office in Tower 2 is larger than Tower 1, it'll potentially appear in next week's Management Minutes
   
   
6. Is interpersonally exploitative
   When management suddenly asks you out for lunch... be wary... be extremely wary.
   
   
7. Lacks empathy
   Calling your staff at 3am in the morning and asking him to drive 200km to the data center on a Christmas Saturday makes perfect sense.
   
   
8. Is often envious of others or believes others are envious of him or her
   Let's be honest now, your day gets ruin should you notice that your staff has a notebook with better specs.
   
   
9. Shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes
   Really? Me? I'm always patient and humble towards everyone that I deal with.
   

There's also a certain pattern that I noticed, Dark Managers with this sickness tends to be short ~ Napoleon Syndrome perhaps? More importantly, they typically don't get promoted any higher up in the food chain and retires as a Manager or if they're lucky a Senior Manager.

Lastly, the worst of the lot are Senior Executives that never makes Manager. Personally, someone should shove em to a loony bin and throw away the keys; and these people supports my case on the uselessness of psychometric tests to weed out these individuals...

To Toe/Tow the Line

Dark Managers also suffer from a parrot reflex of repeating phrases that the CEO uses. At the moment, "towing the line" seems to be spreading around.

It's so odd how its being used in just about every situation. E.g. if the boss shits and you wipe his ass; that's also known as towing the line.

When I did a quick check on wikipedia, it was originally written as to "toe the line" as in when an army commander calls his soldiers to attention, they stand abreast of each other, with each soldier looking down to ensure his/her toes are on the line.

So maybe that's true too, in the even the boss walks by, you'd want your subordinates to "toe the line" and in corporate speak; that means a clean desk, arms always clenching a deck of freshly printed powerpoint presentation plus a 300 page leather bound organizer. Nevermind that you also carry a phone PDA.

Nevermind also that the PowerPoint presentation is merely 5 pages long, but you've printed 20 copies of it just to make it look big.

Governance - Dark Management Style

After working with Governance or Councils or Committees for the last 5 odd years. It dawned on me that perhaps there's a deeper meaning to the purpose of these proceedings:-

1) When any hanky panky needs to be done "officially"
2) To stop any other hanky panky that is not your own
3) To make decisions backed by articles prepared by preferably institutions that are based in US or UK (does not matter that the study is conducted on only American or British soil exclusively). As long as the recommendations are "backed" by those study, somehow responsibility for the decision making is absolved.
4) To ensure that all traceability of accountability does not stick to the governance body.
5) where possible, to deny any initiatives because its better to be safe than sorry.
6) To make decisions that are for the benefit of the Governance/Council/Committee members and hardly ever for the business
7) To pretend that they care only when there is a user representative.

It's also typically manned by folks that are over the hill; the type that just can't get promoted or transferred anywhere else cause nobody really wants them.

I know, its not a funny or sarcastic post... i'm just pissed.

The Rowing Team - Malaysian Version

A Japanese company and a Malaysian company decided to have a canoe race on the Rejang River.

On the big day, the Japanese won by a mile.

The Malaysians, very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the reason for the crushing defeat. A management team made up of senior management was formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action. Their conclusion was the Japanese had 8 people rowing and 1 person steering, while the Malaysian team had 4 governance personnel, a supervisor, a stamping officer, and an assistant offier which checks that the stamping officer has rightfully stamped the supervisor's decisions on how fast the single rower should row. Nobody really knows what the governance personnel do other than deliberating whether the rower is using the correct rowing technique from articles that they subscribe to from a rowing site. So the Malaysian management hired a consulting company and paid them a large amount of money for a second opinion.

They also advised that there were too many people "not rowing" and while the processes and deliberations are important the number of people required can be reduced. The PM was sent the report and he immediately threw it aside.

He decided to let go of the 2 stamping officers, kept the supervisor and made the governance personnel dual role as stampers and governance. Which meant that now the governance people were referring to even more articles both on supervision and rowing. The PM increased the rowers to 3, placed his son and his 2 best friends in the team for exposure.

The next year, the Malaysian team won by two miles!

The 3 rowers were frat buddies with the Japanese rowing team and agreed that they would throw the race in exchange for a business deal. The 4 governance officers still debated only now each one of them felt that the other person was too stupid to understand where they're coming from. The supervisor on the other hand gave an emotional speech thanking everyone for their contributions and everyone got their bonuses. Especially the 3 rowers which immediately became senior managers and needed replacements for next year's race.

Happy and elated, they decided that the following year's team should be the same 4 governance personnel, a single rower, the stamping officer, the assistance stamping officer and the supervisor...

Because the lessons learned database would have enough information to beat the Japanese again

The Rowing Team - An Oldie but a Goldie

A Japanese company and an American company decided to have a canoe race on the Missouri River.

Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak performance before the race.

On the big day, the Japanese won by a mile.

The Americans, very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the reason for the crushing defeat. A management team made up of senior management was formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action. Their conclusion was the Japanese had 8 people rowing and 1 person steering, while the American team had 8 people steering and 1 person rowing. So American management hired a consulting company and paid them a large amount of money for a second opinion.

They advised that too many people were steering the boat, while not enough people were rowing. To prevent another loss to the Japanese, the rowing team's management structure was totally reorganized to 4 steering supervisors, 3 area steering superintendents and 1 assistant superintendent steering manager. They also implemented a new performance system that would give the 1 person rowing the boat greater incentive to work harder. It was called the ' Rowing Team Quality First Program' , with meetings, dinners and free pens for the rower. There was discussion of getting new paddles, canoes and other equipment, extra vacation days for practices and bonuses.
♪

The next year the Japanese won by two miles.

Humiliated, the American management laid off the rower for poor performance, halted development of a new canoe, sold the paddles, and cancelled all capital investments for new equipment. The money saved was distributed to the Senior Executives as bonuses and the next year's racing team was outsourced to India.

Psychometrics don't work well with Asians

Perhaps in this global economy and overwhelming exposure to MTV and American sitcoms and hopefully not British ones like Little Britain; we may all be westernized. I mean, there's a huge difference between race and culture. For example, you could be culturally American but Indian (the Asian kind) racially.

The problem with applying psychometric tests like Myers-Briggs, Cubik's PAPI personality tests and the sorts are that the statistical sampling of results are gathered from prepubescent Americans going through freshmen year; and besides making some money as personality test subjects; side income are also derived from donating sperm or ovarian cells. What's scary is that the "base psychological" profile is then used as a yardstick to measure other people. When applied to Asians you can get pretty warped results.

For example, if you ask an Asian whether he'd report his boss to the authorities for soliciting money from vendors. He'd probably answer no; because his boss is potentially his father and the vendor's his uncle.

Secondly, Asians are taught to be meek towards folks who are:-

• Older than they are
  
• Magically in bred among the Sultanates or of Kingly bloodline. In which case, that person is still a demi God
• Children and family members of major conglomorates. The new "aristocrats" of current times; if you may.
  

In which case; assessments on Assertiveness will not be accurate. Another example, if you're culturally Japanese maybe then tests on making decisions will not be clear cut. Being Chinese if there's a test for greed they'd probably score extremely high.

I hence posit that psychometrics should first start with determining your cultural orientation. With questions like:-

1. Which do you prefer; a Dirty Sanchez or getting stroodled?
2. What happens when you puff the dragon?
3. Do you think its way cool to exclaim "mother-Chot!"?
   
4. Do you "Tah Fei Kei" or paint the ceiling?
   
5. Are kelentits are delicacy in South East Asia; and why?